Philadelphia 76ers Must Choose Roster Carefully

Precision is vital as the Philadelphia 76ers begin to build a team around players. Fit requires more than basketball skill-sets. To build a true team, there must be a shared vision, and compatible personalities. One disgruntled player can undo years of work and sacrifice

It seems silly to suggest that these Philadelphia 76ers should begin to be rigid in their gate-keeping functions when considering who to pursue in upgrading the team roster in the off-season, doesn’t it?  You would think that a nine win team would be happy to get anyone who could dribble, shoot, score, and perhaps even throw in a little defense, right?

Not really.

The team bonding remains fragile now, so very fragile. While the coaching staff, the infrastructure, and even the players themselves have been through so much shared sacrifice, delayed gratification, and struggling to keep the faith in the process, the losses have piled up.  The team has only had one basketball season together to build a level of trust, of respect, and the self-confidence in themselves and confidence in each other.  This roster began the season making introductions to one another.  As the season progressed, injured players became healthy enough to join their teammates.   But the youth, health, unfamiliarity, and slowly developing skillsets as individuals and as a team resulted in far more losses than victories.

We believe that changes next season.  But only under certain conditions.

You see, bringing new faces to the team can do as much damage to whatever progress the team has made as it can place the team on a fast track to building a winner.  Select the wrong player, someone who is selfish, self-centered, egotistical, or even someone who has no respect for teammates, authority, of the painful history of the team, and you will see a rapid devolution of the infantile camaraderie still under construction.

We’ve watched it happen in other Philadelphia sports franchises.  When Terrell Owens was dissatisfied with the Philadelphia Eagles, he turned on his teammates, particularly his star quarterback Donovan McNabb, and tore the locker room apart at the seams until the team cut him.  He was very talented, but his actions tore apart the teamwork that had taken years to build – together.  So too did former Phillies closer Jonathon Palpebon call out teammates and team management to the carpet as he vexed unhappiness with being contracted to a non-contender.

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Beware the players who believe they are larger than the games that they play.  But the right fit extends beyond the basketball court, beyond the front office, and down to the entire staff of the organization.  When the team recruited Dr. David T Martin to come onboard as the Director of Performance Research And Development, they did not appeal to being a pioneer in the field with a basketball team.  They gently emphasized the common goal of excellence, and that was the selling point.

For now, the Philadelphia 76ers have almost no risk of that.  The team is cohesive, has a perceptive head coach in Brett Brown who constantly drills to the team that it is a privilege to play in the NBA, and that each opportunity should witness the maximum effort of anyone who dons the 76ers jersey.   So far that has worked, because most of the players on the team are either too young to have built up a calloused attitude of self-importance, or, as in the case of the few true veterans on the roster, have been selected because of their quiet self confidence and willingness to give back to the younger players as well as to the NBA itself.

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